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Happy One Years Old (and one months) Birthdayz, Us Guys!

Thing that’s true that you care about: It was a breezy July 28th, 2010 when construction crews completed work on the striking and luxurious Cory Clouston Fashion Review headquarters and spa campus. From our offices atop the 82nd floor of the main building we wrote our first post about something really, REALLY memorable. :)! By the way, if anyone can remember how we wrote about stuff for all of August please post your answers in the comment section below.

So puppycats, a lot has changed in a year! From predicting that Peter Regin would score 20 (OR MORE) goals to the namesake of this blog being canned it has been a whirl of wind. All I know is that we are all now very, very wealthy from this blog. Hey, speaking of predictions, this year looks even harder to make totally inaccurate forecasts! Goddamn I cant explain how excited I am to see what the whole mess looks like in action.

Let’s, together, for a moment, imagineer the past season…And by ‘together’ I mean I’m just going to write some stuff…follow along on your computer book!

Though I was never under the impression that the Senators were a cup contender the past few seasons, I did believe they had a shot at the playoffs with their lineup. Well…a shot that leaned heavily on the roulette game that has been the goaltending tandem(s) (do you still call it a tandem when one person becomes a hologram that haunts a body cast?).

The post-Heatley squad who took the team into the first round (if only just to REALLY demonstrate what a tease Pascal Leclaire was) proved that with the parity of the league and a few inexplicable 10 game winning streak bounces, you could at least squeak into the top 8 of the weird, weird East. I thought that was all that mattered. I had a half baked theory that owners/GMs shared a plan along the lines of “If youre a Canadian or big market team, at least stay in the playoff hunt and you’re good.” Now, I’m not trying to infer that these owners and GMs don’t want to compete to the very top of the compete level competramid but I figured in the exact words of The Euge that “Those who live in blow up the team houses should, instead of throwing blow up stones might rather blow themselves————up——–every single day foreve—

Great question(s)! I thought our team was decent enough to keep middling about in the conference for next few seasons til most of the team turned forty. I mean, they were sort of doing that already…I didn’t think they were your perennial shot-at-the-cup-haver Pittsborough Pengus but not quite your New York Island of Dr. Moreau’s Lottery Pixx either. To me, I figured at the start of the season that the Sens still rested in the creamy middle. Sure the goaltending was often terrifying to watch but lest we forget the case of Boucher vs. Niemi: Stanley Cup final. That factor, coupled with our capable core of all too familiar faces like Uncle Chris Kelly and Cousin you have a crush on Mike Fisher… as fans, I figured, the only real shake up we’d see would be our revolving door of trade deadline rentals. Why should management/ownership sacrifice dependable middleship for Garbageship? – literally a ship made of garbage. All it took was that one win in a month sans Jason Spezza to really put it out there that this squad we once loved along with Alex Kovalev…was done. The Sens…stunk and didn’t look like they cared much about their odor.

Grandpapaw Murray held a fire sale retaining only his captain, his star centre, his shut(ish)down defenseman, his goon, and his robot kneed-husky faced winger as his core of vets, Gonchar and Karlsson as America’s favorite cat and mouse team and also Foligno, Regin, Lee, Carkner and Kuba as his delta squadron…of…dudes who…are…Anyway, do I need to continue this recap? It’s still August and you have nothing else to read (WHY ELSE WOULD YOU BE HERE?) so Im going to continue to recap. New to the fold came Craig Anderson, Bobby Butlaaaah, Eric Condra, Colin Greening, Zack Smith. These guys actually looked pretty alright given a consistent shot. Oh but there’s a new creamy middle for 2011-2012. The sweet, sweet run off of the rebuild, the new, young guys waiting and sharpening their throwing stars in the shadows to actually compete for jobs that they could possibly get : Da Costa, Cowan, Rundblad, Zibanejad, Nikita Filatov (remember THAT?), Lehner, Weircioch, Silferberg, infinity. Also, something something Alex Auld is back aaaaaand something something SOMETHING Zenon Konopka ladies and germs(tlemen)!

… So the point is…”Who am this squadron and why me are pretty into this?” Gone are the stalwart questions like: Can Mike Fisher have a similar season to last year? Can Chris Kelly have a similar season to last year? Who will Ruutu eat? How many years will Kovalev be resigned for and for HOW MANY MORE MILLIONS? Which goalie will be first to lose and then regain and then lose starting position? Who will be acquired at the deadline for our one possible round? Can Karlsson and Kuba PLEASE trade contracts? Nope. Not no mores…those questions. Well maybe the last one.

The Ottawa Mysterions take the ice in a little over a month. I gotta say, Im nervously excited about the team…I don’t know if they’ll do all that great but it is titillating that I have very little clue how they’ll do this season. When Verada used to say “Blow up this team already” I used to bristle and argue against it because, to be perfectly frank, I didn’t think I could stomach the bottom dwelling. I feel ive been steeled a bit by last season’s total lethargic garbage dump of a showing. We “survived” *rolls eyes at self* that mess, surly it will be more fun to watch a potentially steamrolled team with some HEART. That and a goalie who has a chance of saving a rebound. Yes, the organization is selling hope (and weird nostalgia from yestercentury) but I don’t think it can be denied that this year IS different. I am actually excited to attend preseason games BECAUSE of the lineup of non-stars instead of just wondering when Jim O’Brien was going to break his LEGENDARY silence about not coming close to making the line up.